The Brookhaven leader. [volume] (Brookhaven, Miss.) 1883-1891, 1887-03-10

exits and changes we may trifie, but not
about this. Stupendous moment OF
life-quitting. Oh, when the great
tides OF eternity arise about us,
and fill the soul and surround IL,
and sweep IT out toward rapture or
woe, ali, that will be "the swelling Of Jor-
DAM" l know people sometimes talk
very merrily about the departure from
this life. am very sorry TO hear 1t. But
men do make fun Of the passage from one
world to another. Byron joked a great
deal about it, but when it came he shiv-
cred with horror Many an infidcl has
scoffed at the idea of fearing a future
world, but lying upon his pillow in the
last hour his teeth have chartered with
terror. saw, in Westminster Abb ", an
upon his tomb
Life is n Jest
And all things show ii.
thought so once,
But now know Il.
thought how inapt that, in place OF
sepulChre. men should try their witticisms.
A great German having rejected Christ,
in his last moment said: ''Give me light,
give me lghtv Oh we may be smart
with our witticism about the last hour;
but when 1t comes and the tides are rising,
and the surf is beating, and the winds are
bowling, we will each one, my brethren,
find for himself that it is 1.-The swelling of
Jordan" Our natural courage won't hold
out then. However familiar we NAV have
been with scenes of mortality, however
much we may have screwed our courage
up, we want something moro than natural
resources.
When the northeast wind blows off
frfAr hn &C
out all earthly lights. The lamp of
the gospel God-lighted, is the only
lamp that can stand in that blast The
weakest arm holding that shall not be
confounded; the strongest one rejoicing
that shall tumble and die. When the Jor
dan rises in its wrath, the first dash of its
wave will swamp them forever. We feel
how sad it is for a man to atte mpt this life
without religion. We see what doleful
thing it is for man to go down into the
IN isfortunes of life without Christian
solaCe; but il that be so, how much more
terrible whoa that man comes face to face
with the solcmnities of the last houri Oh,
if in the bright sunshine of health and
prosperity man fell the need of some
thing better, how VIII he feel when the
shadows Of the last hour gather above his
pillows If, in the warmth Of worldly
prosperity, he was sometimes dismayed.
how vii! he feoi when the last chill creeps
over him! If while things were COMPARE
lively smooth he was disquioted, what
Will ne do in the agonies of dissolution'
If, in the land OF peace in which thou trusted
they wearied thee, what wilt thou do amid the
swelling Of Jordan;
Oh, | re iOice % know that so many of
Gods children have gone through that
pass without shudder. Some one said
to a dying Christian:
"Isu't it hard for you to get out Of this
world:'
oh no." he says, lit is easy dying; it
is blessed DYING: it IS glorious diving
And then he pointed to a clock on the
wall and said:
The last two hours in which Ihave been
dying have had more joy than all the
years of my life"
A general came into the hospital after
the battle, and there We're many seriously
wounded, and there was one man dying,
and the General sad:
Al, my dear fellow, you seem very
much wounded. am afraid you are not
going to get we'll
"No," said the soldier, II am not goinr
to get WEI. but feel very happy"
Oh, have seen them, aad so have y5-
60 cut Of this lfe without a tear on THEN
check. There was weeping all around
the room, but no weeping in the bed; the
c hoeEs were dry They were not thrown
into darkness; they were lifted mp. We
saw the tides rising around them, and the
swelling Of the wave. It washed them off
from the cares and tolls of life; it washed
them on toward the beach of heaven.
They waved TO US a farewell kiss as they
stood ON deck. aud tioated down further
and further waited by gales from heaven,
until they We're lost to our sight-mor-
tally having become Immortality
iifrs duty done sinks the clay,
Light from It's load the spirit flies
While Heaven and earth combine TO say.
How blest the righteous when he dies.
What Il GA consolation TO you that your
departed friends were not submerged in
the swelling of Jordan The Israelites
Were Just as thoroughly alive on the west
ern banks Of the Jordan as they had been
on the eastern banks of the Jordan; and
our departed Christian friends have only
crossed oVcr--nCt sick. not dead, not eX-
haus ed. not tXtnguished, not blotted out.
Tut with healthier SEPARATION and stout
er pulses, and keener cycsight, and better
prospects, crossed over, their sins, their
physical and mental disquiet, all left
clear this side, an eternally flowing, i'm
passable obstacle between them and all
human and satanic pursuit. Crossed over!
Oh, shake hands OF congratulatiOn with
all the bCreaVed in the consideration tha
our departed Christian friends are safe!
Why was there, years ago, so much joy
in certain circles in New York when peo-
pie heard from their friends who were on
.A1a
thought that vessel had gone to the bot
tom of the sea; and when the friends on
this side heard that the steamer had ar
rived safely in Liverpool, had we not the
right to congratulate the people in New
York that their friends had got safely
across? And is it not right this morning
that | congratulate you that your departed
friends are safe on the shore of heaven!
Would you have them back again!
Would you have those old parents back
again. You know how hard 1t was some
times t or them to get their breath in the
stified atmosphere of the summer;
would you have them back in this
summer! Didn't they use their BRAN
long enough! Would you have your chill
dren back again. Would you have them
take the risk of temptations which throng
every human pathway. Would you have
them cross the Jordan three times in ad
dition to crossing it already, and cross il
again to greet you now, and then cross il
| back afterward! for certainly you would
not keep them forever out of Heaven. II
they had lived forty or fifty years longer,
would they have been safe' Perhaps So
| perhaps not.
| Pause and weep, not from the freed from pain
But that the sigh of love should pull them bach
| again.